A mother shares her terrifying ordeal after her anaesthesia wore off during a C-section.
Joy quickly turned to horror
Danielle Parry, a mother-of-one shared that she had to undergo an emergency C-section since her child wasn’t coming out. Thankfully, after the C-section, she heard her baby’s first cry. However, her joy quickly turned to horror as her spinal block wore off soon after her baby was delivered.
She wrote on her blog exactly how it felt like:
What happened next was something I wish upon no one. Sensation in my body was returning, the numbed tugs and pulls I felt were now producing pains; throbbing, stinging, burning, every type of pain imaginable. To my horror the spinal block had worn off and I could feel the surgeons putting my internal organs back in the correct place then stitching me back together. My voice was shallow and croaky but I tried my hardest to tell them I could feel it. It was dismissed and I was simply told I “couldn’t feel pain” due to the spinal block. They were wrong, I knew what I was feeling, how could they possibly know?!
In spite of what happened, Danielle has chosen not to take any legal action against the hospital. She says, “I guess I was just the unlucky one, but when I look at my beautiful son, I feel anything but unlucky.”
Diagnosed with PTSD
The trauma that stemmed from the incident caused Danielle to be diagnosed with PTSD. She shares, “I never dreamt that giving birth would give me PTSD. It should have been the happiest moment of my life, but it was a nightmare in the end.”
She related that she started having panic attacks just three days after the incident, when she had to be immediately taken to the emergency room for an appendectomy. Danielle said that she had flashbacks and panic attacks, but didn’t really think much of it.
She then realized that something might be wrong when she went to the dentist for a checkup, and as she recalls, “As soon as I sat in the chair, my heart started racing, I got sweaty and started breathing heavily. I couldn’t breathe and began gasping for air. My dentist had no idea why I was freaking out so much, it was only a check up.”
Danielle returned three weeks later to for a filling but once again her anxiety came back as soon as she sat in the dentist’s chair. She went to a doctor to get identify what was causing her anxiety, and she was found to have PTSD.
What causes PTSD and how can it be treated?
According to Psychguides, “PTSD is generally caused by personally experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event. This can include a single event such as a serious accident, assault or sudden death of a loved one. Repeated experiences during childhood can cause PTSD such as abuse or neglect.”
In Danielle’s case, her PTSD was caused by the experience that she had when the spinal block suddenly wore off during her C-section.
For people suffering from PTSD, the most common types of treatment are anxiety management, cognitive therapy, and exposure therapy. In some cases, psychiatrists also prescribe different antidepressants or mood stabilizers.
However, family support is very important for people suffering from PTSD. Providing encouragement and understanding really helps patients gradually recover from trauma. Being supportive and patient throughout a friend or a family member’s struggle with PTSD can really impact their lives in a positive way.
Sources: pjmedia.com, thesun.co.uk
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